Dear Dean Kmiec,It is my pleasure to inform you that The Catholic University of America Trial Advocacy team took first place in the Second Annual Northeast Regional Criminal Justice Trial Advocacy Competition held October 27-28 in New Haven, Connecticut. The competition is sponsored by, Quinnipiac University School of Law and The Criminal Justice Section of The American Bar Association. Representing CUA were Michael Cox, Collin Geiselman, Michael Kinslow, Kevin Mitchell and John Sharifi. The team secured an automatic bid to the Final Round of the National Competition to be held in Chicago in the spring.

Sincerely,
Professor Lou BarracatoThe Catholic University of America School of Law

Dear Editor:I want to compliment you on the updated format and focus of CUA Lawyer. I enjoy reading about fellow alumni and how they have applied their skills in the workplace, and the features on alumni in public service are terrific!

Dear Dean Kmiec,I have just been advised that David Esau won third place in the 2001 Association of Securities and Exchange Commission Alumni's Securities Law Writing Competition.

David, a member of the Securities Program, wrote on "A Solution in Need of a Problem: A Comment on the Potential Regulatory Arbitrage and Inter-Agency Tension Created by the Commodity Futures Modernization Act's Introduction of Securities Futures."

This writing competition, in part because of the organization that sponsors it, is probably the single most significant securities law writing competition in the country. Please join me in congratulating David.

Sincerely,
Professor David LiptonThe Catholic University of America School of Law

Dear Editor:CUA Lawyer is looking terrific!

Derek Khlopin, '96Director of Law and Public Policy, TIA

Dear Dean Kmiec:

As a Catholic lawyer, I was pleased with your comments in the January edition of CUA Online. I am a criminal prosecuting attorney for the state of Arizona and graduated from the School of Law at Creighton University in Omaha, a Jesuit institution, in May 1976.

Although not an alum of CUA, I agree wholeheartedly with your view that CUA and Notre Dame are unfortunately the only true Catholic law schools left in this country who not only focus on the teaching of the law but also transmission of the Catholic Faith. It is a sad commentary on the status of many of our so called Catholic colleges and universities.

Without being too critical, suffice to say that is the primary reason I have spurned my Jesuit alma mater's frequent appeals for contributions.

I think CUA in general is one of the best kept secrets not only in this country but also within the general Catholic community. Ask a Catholic to state the name of the only national, papal chartered Catholic university established by the American bishops and invariably they will reply "Notre Dame". They will be surprised to learn that such is not correct. I enjoyed your quip about how Notre Dame has an NBC contract for its football games, (not that it did them any good on the field this past season), but that CUA has a papal charter. I think it is high time CUA, alumni, and friends, start getting the word out to the Catholic community in particular and the nation at large, that CUA is a priceless treasure essentially still waiting to be discovered.

I am pleased the President appointed a person who has not spent his entire life on the East Coast but also understands that there is a vast country filled with bright Catholic students west of Maryland.

Unfortunately, I do not believe CUA will be able to legitimately claim "national" status in fact, until it expands the reach of its student body to recruit the best and brightest Catholic students also residing west of Pittsburgh. A review of the home states of the undergraduate student body, in particular the student-athletes, lists a depressingly disproportionate number of persons from states within a 200 mile radius of Washington D.C. In that respect, Notre Dame and Georgetown can claim more of a Catholic national status than CUA at the present time.(But as a priest friend of mine once only half-jokingly said to me, "Are the words Georgetown and Catholic oxymorons?") That is regrettable because CUA truly has the right to claim the unique distinction of being the only national university of the Catholic Church in this country.

My law school dean at Creighton, Dean Steven Frankino, subsequently became one of your predecessors at CUA School of Law. I stayed in touch with him and he frequently extolled to me the unrealized possibilities of Columbus School of Law in particular and CUA in general. When in D.C. I always make it a point not to visit Bill Clinton's alma mater, but rather one of the few universities left in this country which can claim faithfulness to the priceless Catholic heritage we are so fortunate to enjoy in this great country, i.e., Catholic University of America.

I wish you and your staff all of the best and if there is anything I can do to start spreading the word about CUA in general and the School of Law in particular out here in the great American Southwest, I hope you will do me the honor of calling upon me.